


you're my medicine

by Enochianess



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe, Depression, Eating Disorders, Fluff and Angst, I swear it is not as bad as it seems, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, M/M, Self-Harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-21
Updated: 2019-01-21
Packaged: 2019-10-13 15:41:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,553
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17490704
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Enochianess/pseuds/Enochianess
Summary: Steve's not sure whether Bucky ever really noticed how sad he was, but Steve knew. He saw it every time his eyes flickered over to him. The air around him was so delicate and breakable, icy to the touch and acidic in taste.Two boys, broken and hurting, but clinging on to the world and each other. This is a story of pain and desperation, of hope and an amazing strength to keep on going, to keep putting one foot in front of the other.





	you're my medicine

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is incredibly personal to me. The characters both have experiences and qualities relating to myself. It's not written to romanticise mental illness, but quite the opposite. It's frank and ugly and also hopeful at times.
> 
> There are triggers for self harm, eating disorders, and primarily depression. Please be careful.
> 
> This fic was originally written in first person, then edited for another fandom, and finally I've edited it for this fandom because I wanted to share it with more people. I originally wrote it when I was eighteen, so I also apologise if it's not great!

"Your hands are like stars," Bucky had said to him once.

Steve thinks he replied with, "What the hell are you talking about?"

To which he probably answered with a soft, "I don't know."

Bucky did that a lot. He noticed things. Steve has often wondered if he noticed too many things. He was never a wallflower though; he had friends and he knew how to interact with practically anyone with an outstanding level of charm and wit. The thing was, Bucky could never stay in one place for too long and his mind was an organised mess of characters and poetry and ultimately an unendurable sadness.

Steve's not sure whether Bucky ever really noticed how sad he was, but Steve knew. He saw it every time his eyes flickered over to him. The air around him was so delicate and breakable, icy to the touch and acidic in taste. Sometimes Steve would walk over to him and wrap his arms around Bucky's torso, pressing his lips tenderly to his neck with the hope of giving him some semblance of warmth. It wasn't just a figment of Steve's imagination though, he was always telling him that he was cold, but then Bucky would kiss him hard enough to bruise and tell him how it burnt. He liked to burn, and it would have worried Steve if he wasn't so keen to stand there and burn with him.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

Steve's mother worried about them both of course. Often they'd be laid out on their balcony, a book in Steve's hand whilst Bucky attempted to make patterns as he exhaled the smoke from deep inside his lungs, and they'd hear a dull thudding from the other side of the front door. Steve would sigh as he looked down at Bucky's glassy eyes and frozen naked torso and then he'd rise to his feet and go back inside to let her in.

"Steve, you look chilled to the bone! What on earth have you been doing?" she would exclaim in a shrilly voice that always set his nerves more on edge. "Is Bucky outside? He's not still smoking that horrible stuff that makes his eyes go all funny is he?" she'd carry on. "Bucky, darling, it's me! Will you come and say hello?" she'd call out to him.

Steve would count to twenty-seven and then his head would appear around the corner before the rest of him slid gracefully into the room.

"Merciful heavens, child! Not again!" she would cry in that way that only mothers can in times of distress.

Bucky's mouth would twitch into a hint of a lopsided smile before he would look down and start nibbling on his chapped lips, red tongue quickly swiping across the bottom lip to make it easier.

"He's okay, Mom," Steve would assure her in a hoarse voice. "We're both okay. We're just fine," he'd carry on.

"But those bruises are new aren't they? And Christ I can just about see every rib! Let me look in your cupboards. If money's the problem I'll buy you some food. Steve, you know I'll buy you food if you need it." Then she'd shuffle over to their minuscule kitchen that comprised of two and a half cupboards and a little fridge. "Steve, there is food in here," she would say flatly. "Bucky, why aren't you eating? Christ, child, you need to eat! Here let me make you something. Wait, Steve why aren't you feeding him if he won't feed himself? Steve, he needs to eat," she would scold.

"Mom, Bucky is tired. Can you come back later please? Let me make him some coffee and get him in the shower. Come back later, we'll eat then," he'd say.

Then she would sigh, nod, pat them both unceremoniously on the head, and leave. She never would come back later.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

Bucky didn't have a disorder. Well, he did, but not of the eating variety. At least, Doctor Thomas had never said that he had, and as far as they were both concerned that meant he was in the clear. Bucky ate sometimes and he wasn't dying, so Steve never asked him to eat and if he said he wasn't hungry then Steve would nod and make them both a coffee. Bucky liked his coffee and he liked his books and he liked his cigarettes and he liked the stars. These things had always seemed significant to Steve over the years, so he thought he understood Bucky when he'd whisper about it all to him, but now Steve thinks he never really did understand. When it came to Bucky it was difficult to ever really know what he meant because he was just so much more than anyone and anything else. Steve would often find himself staring into his blue-grey eyes and it would feel like flying and falling all at once, and Steve would swear there were universes exploding in their depths.

"I like it when you look at me like that," Bucky would whisper.

"Like what?" Steve would reply.

"Like your feet can't touch the floor and the whole damn world is crashing down," he'd say.

Steve was never sure what he meant when he'd say things like that, but the soft passionate edge to his voice made the blood in Steve's veins thrum and his stomach leap into his lungs and the earth would spin so fast that no other words from any other human being had ever sounded so fitfully beautiful.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

On days when there was little else other than blood and acid and saltwater and everything and nothing at all, sometimes Bucky's words would come back to Steve and Steve would swear that he finally got it, because some days he would wake up and the earth would be still but it felt as if everything would suddenly collapse. Bucky knew these days and he would hold Steve tight enough that the stitches that kept him together wouldn't fall apart and he'd carry Steve around with his body hanging from his like a koala until his bones started to ache and then they'd get in the car and drive out of the city. Steve can't pinpoint a time that they started to do this, or who's idea it had been, but on days beginning with the consonant 't' it seemed to help. They lay down side by side on the hood of the car, 'Shake Me Down' playing on full volume, and they'd watch the clouds. They didn't hold hands, but Bucky's foot would always tap against Steve's in time with the music and after a moment or two Steve would stop drowning and choking on nothingness and he'd curl up in a ball and begin to cry. Bucky would give him forty-eight seconds and then he'd pick Steve up and put him in the passenger seat. On the way home Steve would sit under a quilt his mother had given him at some point in the past and sip the caramel flavoured coffee that Bucky always seemed to carry for him and then 'Sweet Disposition' would start playing and Steve would sing loudly. Then they'd park the car and drag their tired bodies up the seven flights of metal steps and fall through the door and into bed.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

Steve remembers one morning he woke up to Bucky's lips pressing softly against his shoulder blade, his tongue tentatively brushing the pale skin and his teeth tugging. Steve felt Bucky smile against him at the sound of his gasp and it had made Steve so content that he wished the moment was frozen.

"You taste sad this morning," Bucky whispered as he lowered his weight onto Steve's back. How he knew that Steve liked to be smothered when they spoke about these things Steve wasn't sure, but he was thankful that he did nonetheless.

"It's a Wednesday today," Steve replied randomly.

"You shouldn't be sad. You deserve to be the happiest person in the world. If you were a flower you would be the prettiest of them all, and I would lay out on the grass beside you and talk to you all day long until you grew tall and strong. I'd never let you die. Beautiful things like stories and stars and flowers and the sun and you should never die. Promise me you'll never die," he murmured into Steve's neck.

"Bucky, everyone dies. You'll die. I'll die. Even the sun will die one day," Steve told him.

"If you die then it doesn't matter if everything else dies. If you die then so will I," he stated.

"Don't be silly, darling. Think of my poor mother if we both were to die," Steve joked before yawning and nuzzling his head further into his pillow.

"When do you think I'll die?" Bucky asked after a moment.

"Never. As long as the world is still spinning and the ground hasn't collapsed, you'll remain in the air and the soil and the sky and in every fucking living thing there is in this world because you could never die, Bucky. You're too special for that. Universes would weep if you didn't exist. Now lets not talk about this anymore. Kiss my neck until we both fall asleep so it doesn't have to be Wednesday," Steve said.

And so he did.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

"Your hair is soft today," Steve murmured as he ran his fingers through the brown fluffy mess. "Maybe its because you didn't sleep. Tired eyes and soft hair and pale skin and, sweetheart, you've got the most beautiful lavender shadows beneath your eyes," Steve cooed.

"I look awful," Bucky replied glumly.

"No you don't. You never look awful," Steve told him.

"You're lying. Except, I know you're not a compulsive liar because Doctor Thomas has never said that, so maybe it's just been too long since you've seen anyone else. Perhaps our sense of beauty becomes warped if we don't leave a room for five days," he said.

"Bucky, it hasn't been that long since we left. We went to the newsagents yesterday to buy Nutella remember?" Steve reminded him.

"Did you look at anyone especially closely?" he asked.

"Yes. The Chinese man that worked behind the counter in the shop had very nice eyes. They were like sapphires, Bucky, like the ones on that ring you found once. Where did that go anyhow? It must be in a drawer somewhere but I think you moved it when my mother came around so you could hide the cigarettes," Steve said.

"It's in the bath," Bucky replied.

"You shouldn't ever call yourself awful, you know. I love you and if you're awful then my love is awful, and if love is awful then I really don't know what any of us are doing here," Steve whispered.

"I don't always think I'm awful, but you love me and you're sad and what if that's something I've done?" he asked, his eyes seeming child-like when he tilted his head up to look at Steve.

"You don't make me sad. I did that all by myself. It is because I'm made of so many patches and they're not stitched together properly. It's not your fault," Steve said.

"Its my fault I can't sow," Bucky mumbled quietly before looking away again.

Steve wrapped his limbs around him and squeezed him tightly as Steve's lungs filled with saltwater. The tears that spilt from his chin and onto Steve's shoulder felt like acid as together they rode out the storm that had suddenly hit, and if it weren't for Bucky, Steve swears he would have disappeared. Everything seemed terribly unfair as Steve held this broken but beautiful piece of art in his arms.

"I'll get my mother to teach you," Steve whispered after a while because even if he was drowning he needed to make sure Bucky made it to shore.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

"I met a man today. His cat had just died," Bucky greeted him one day when Steve got home from work.

He was sat slumped on a deck chair by the balcony, the window thrown open in an attempt to vacuum the swirling smoke from the room. Bucky was still wearing his leather jacket, so Steve knew he hadn't been home long. Steve could tell the day had been unkind to him by the blood on his fingertips from where he'd probably torn his nails to death with his teeth.

"Was he okay?" Steve thinks he might have asked him.

"He was a damn idiot that man. This cat could have been the best cat a man has ever had, but all the man seemed to care about is where to put the body. He said he didn't want to take it to the vet in case they charged him. The whole world runs on money," he explained.

"You don't really think that do you?" Steve asked him. He already knew the answer of course.

"No. Of course I don't," he replied.

"I quit my job," Steve told him.

"Good," he replied. Then, after a moment, "I think we should get a cat."

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

"Do you think I made him more unhappy, Mom?" Steve asked his mother on a rainy Friday afternoon in late November.

"Steve, why would you think that?" she had replied with a deep frown. She was knitting a green scarf and she'd recently taken to keeping her needles in her hair so she wouldn't lose them anymore. Steve pointed to her head when she started huffing in exasperation because she couldn't find it and had forgotten about her new 'safe place'.

"Well, I think he's always been sad, but he never saw a doctor before we were together and now he goes nearly as often as I do," Steve told her.

"He only started going because you told him to, darling. Otherwise he would have carried on doing it all by himself. It does no good to keep it all bottled up though. I think going to the doctor is very beneficial for him," she explained.

"But he's still so sad," Steve whispered.

"Steve, you've been going for nearly two years now and you're still not fine either, so don't go expecting too much of him," she scolded.

"Mom, that's not what I meant. I'm just worried. He thinks so much, I fear it'll destroy him one day," he admitted.

"I think it might do. It happens to lots of writers. Unfortunately, you don't really choose writing; it chooses you," she said.

"That sounds like such bullshit. I think it's the kind of thing that only Bucky can get away with saying," he told her.

"Is he still hurting himself?" she asked worriedly.

Steve winced as her knitting speed seemingly picked up pace. "I don't know what you're talking about, Mom."

"Steve, I've seen those bruises on his ribs and on his stomach. I know he's always pinching and prodding at himself." 

"He can't help it," Steve whispered.

"I know he can't, dear. I just wish all that medication that the two of you have to take would actually help a little more," she said.

"It does help. He just struggles sometimes, with himself," Steve explained.

"Don't we all?" she asked.

Steve didn't know what to say after that and he doesn't think he opened his mouth again until Bucky got home with a new pack of cigarettes and a smile on his face. He looked cold, but the air around him seemed less fragile for once and Steve couldn't help but give out a sigh of relief.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

Steve had always liked grocery shopping because it had always seemed so full of possibility. It's kind of a strange opinion to have about such a measly task, but there is more choice in a grocery store than there is in most of life. Steve never said this to Bucky, but he bet he understood.

"Don't you think fruit is kind of fascinating?" Bucky had asked him as he put an avocado into the cart.

"What are you talking about?" Steve replied.

"Well, fruit isn't really made of anything is it? It just is what it is. Obviously it's made of cells and stardust and whatever other shit it is that scientists say things are made of. But, ultimately, an avocado is just made of avocado isn't it?" he said.

"Bucky, sometimes I think you're a genius, sometimes I think you're very bored, and other times I think you're damn insane," Steve told him.

"What do you think of me today?" he asked.

"I think I love you. I don't really know what to do with that." 

"You don't need to do anything with it. You're allowed to feel things, Stevie," he said.

"Stevie?" Steve asked.

"Yes. Today is a Saturday and I felt like calling you Stevie. It's good to be spontaneous sometimes."

"Jesus Christ."

"Is that what you're going to call me today?" he asked smugly.

"You're annoying and I want to kiss you," Steve said with a smile.

"You're funny," he said with a matching smile.

"Come on, Jesus, let's get the fucking shopping done so we can go home," Steve mumbled as he started to push the cart to the next aisle.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

Bucky was a unique person and his memory was very precise. One Wednesday morning, whilst Franz was sitting in the sink, they were sat facing each other in the bath. Steve's head was resting against the cool tiled wall and his eyes were closed. Bucky was rubbing Steve's legs.

"Bucky, what color top was the first person you had sex with wearing when you met them?" Steve asked. He waited three seconds.

"Yellow," Bucky replied.

"I've always liked yellow." 

"Me too." 

"Did you love them?" Steve asked.

"I thought so. I don't know though. We always want to believe the people we have sex with mean everything or nothing at all." 

"I guess that's true." 

"What about you? What color was he wearing?" he asked.

"I don't know. I was drunk and it was dark. I don't think he even asked for my name," Steve replied.

"I'm sorry."

"What for?" Steve didn't understand.

"I'm sorry that you had to be with someone that didn't care enough," he murmured. He pressed tiny butterfly kisses to both knees and then continued rubbing.

"I was young and stupid," Steve told him.

"It doesn't matter. Someone like you should never be taken advantage of. You're different to everyone else. I could see it the moment I met you," he said.

"Bucky, you're a poet; a beautiful manipulator of the written word, an artist. Of course that's what you saw. To an everyday person though, I look like an everyday boy."

"I'd like to see less sometimes," he whispered.

Steve opened his eyes to find him staring at the cat. "I know." 

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

"Remind me why we're doing this again," Bucky muttered.

It was January and they were stood outside a house that seemed to thrum with the bass of a song Steve was sure neither of them had ever heard before. He was also sure that neither of them liked it very much. Bucky had his hands buried in the pockets of his black jeans and even though Steve craved the comfort of his fingers entwined with his, he couldn't stand the thought of him getting any colder than he knew he was already.

"We're here because your best friend is having a party and even we need to socialise with other people sometimes. We don't have to stay long. We'll go in and say hello and have less than mediocre conversations with less than mediocre people and then we can go home and feed the cat," Steve said to him.

"You look very pretty," Bucky replied with a faint smile.

The door swung open and they both turned to stare into the glassy eyes of Bucky's best friend of seven years.

"Bucky, you're here! Thank fuck. And you brought your hot side piece too!" Monty cheered with his arms outstretched.

Steve rolled his eyes and looked over to Bucky. He wasn't pleased. He never looked pleased around Monty.

"Where's the drink?" Bucky asked in a soft voice.

"Kitchen out back," Monty answered.

"Thanks," he replied with a small nod of his head.

Steve relaxed as Bucky's arm wound around his waist to keep him close once they began to move through the cramped house. The kitchen was brimming with people and they all smelt foul and Bucky and Steve took one look at each other before turning around and walking back out into the street again.

"Get onto my back, Stevie," Bucky said.

Steve jumped up and wrapped his arms and legs tightly around him. Steve knew he was cold. He stretched down with one arm to pull a cigarette and lighter from his back pocket and quickly lit it before reaching around to place it between his lips.

"That was a good party," Bucky whispered on an exhale.

"Let's go and feed the cat. Poor little Franz. Poor little stupid cat," Steve replied.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

"This was a stupid idea," Steve muttered as he picked the gravel from his sticky knee.

Bucky had said that it was a nice afternoon to go skateboarding. Steve had never been skateboarding before. He had bad balance and one leg slightly longer than the other. The session ended with blood streaming down his legs and soaking into his new white socks.

"I'm sorry," Bucky replied.

He watched Steve picking the stones out and then slapped his hands away. Steve watched intently as he carefully cleaned the wounds and wrapped bandages around them. Steve never asked why he had a makeshift first-aid kit in his jacket pocket.

"It's fine, Buck. It's not your fault I suck," Steve told him.

"Do they sting?" he asked as he started to kiss the trails of dry blood down Steve's shins.

"A little. But I actually kind of like it. It kind of feels electric, you know?" Steve replied.

Bucky nodded against him and released a shaky exhale. When Bucky lifted his head to lock his eyes with Steve's, Steve swears there had been fear swimming in them.

"Would you be mad if I said that I dream of that sometimes?" Bucky asked.

"Dreamed of what? Me hurting myself?"

"No, no, no! Never that! I mean me! It's just, sometimes I dream about hurting myself. I dream of hurting myself so badly that I'm lying paralysed in a puddle of my own blood and then you find me and lay down beside me and it's warm because blood is warm and I start falling so quickly that my heart and my stomach and my lungs are ripped out of my body and I'm just this weird jelly structure that keeps falling. I know it's strange. It frightens me sometimes. It makes me think I'm going crazy. But sometimes I just really want to hurt myself. Do you ever get that? I don't want you to. I never want you to hurt, Stevie. I'm sorry I made you hurt," Bucky said in a whispered rush.

"Jesus Christ," Steve muttered as he pulled Bucky's body to his and dug his nails into his back.

The taste of metal was hard on Steve's tongue and he remembers feeling like screaming until all the saltwater in his lungs was gone and the air became lighter. His breath felt harsh and so sharp and so quick and the world felt hazy and sluggish and dreamlike as his knees continued to throb. Over Bucky's shoulder Steve could see lilac flowers growing in the grass the same shade as cold, tired eyelids and there were children with such papery and wintery skin playing on swings and metal frames. There were crows, black and haunting, circling, and for a short moment Steve felt like he was flying too, somewhere up in the sky with them, with his heart in his lungs and his feet unable to touch the ground. But then Bucky's arms tightened around him and his lips brushed against Steve's collarbones and gravity was prevalent once more.

"It's going to be okay, Stevie," he whispered.

"We're fine," Steve replied quietly.

"We're fine." 

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

Bucky came home drunk one night and Steve had been in bed frightened for hours. It had been almost two in the morning when he crept in through the front door and Steve had immediately started to cry.

"Stevie?" he whispered in the dark.

"I'm… over here… you fucking idiot," Steve replied in between sobs.

Bucky undressed quickly and slipped into bed. His face loomed over Steve's almost straightaway and he sucked Steve's bottom lip into his mouth like he always did when it started quivering.

"Why are you crying?" he asked once the sobs had subsided and only tears fell.

"I don't know," Steve replied.

Bucky smiled sadly at him and popped a cigarette between his lips and lit it quickly. Steve watched as he got up and walked over to the cupboards to make him a bowl of cereal. Steve laid back and blew a ring of smoke and stared in fascination as it rose up, up, up.

"Did you have fun tonight?" Steve asked him.

"I think so," he replied.

He hadn't though. Steve knew that and so did he, but they never spoke about it.

"I finished my book," Steve told him when he sat back down.

Steve traded him the cigarette for the cereal and started spooning it into his mouth as Bucky sucked the smoke into his lungs like a drowning man gulping in oxygen.

"What happened?" he asked.

"Absolutely nothing," Steve replied.

"I always wonder about why writers do that. I mean, are they trying to teach us that sometimes there's just nothing and life is pointless? Don't they understand that sometimes we need help? Why can't they help us goddamnit?" he muttered.

"I'm not sure anyone can help us. That's the beauty of life, isn't it? We're all doomed but we carry on anyway," Steve said.

"I don't believe that. I don't think suffering is beautiful. I think it's hideous. I hate it. I hate the way it hurts you, Steve. I hate that it eats you alive. I hate seeing it tearing you to pieces every fucking day and I hate having to watch you try and sow yourself back up because I don't fucking know how to do it. I hate that when you wake up in the morning you have to swallow those fucking pills. I hate that you have to sit in that room with a doctor that stares at you and pretends to care but at the end of the day gets to go home and be okay whilst you come home and can't breathe. I hate that you're sad. I hate that you're so sad that it's sunk its claws deep enough that you don't even want to pull them out again because that would hurt even more. I hate how sometimes your eyes die and your laugh turns empty, not because you become any less beautiful, but because you can't see anything other than the world crashing down around you. You can't even see me sometimes. It scares me when you can't see me because if you can't see me then I don't think anyone else can either and what if that means I don't even exist anymore? Do you ever think about that? Do you ever think that maybe you're not even here?" he rambled.

Steve said nothing as he left the bed again and went out onto the balcony. The breeze that swept into the room was cold and immediately sank deep into Steve's bones, but he knew Bucky was cold too and he supposed that if he could cope then so could Steve. Bucky had been drunk and when they woke up the next morning he smiled at Steve and they were okay again. Steve's not even convinced that these late night conversations ever happened. He often thinks they were dreams. In some ways he really wished they were because he couldn't stand how much Bucky hurt for him.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

"What's your favourite flavour ice cream, Stevie?" Bucky asked as soon as Steve answered the phone one Monday morning.

"Why aren't you in bed? It's five in the morning," Steve replied hoarsely.

"I woke up and decided to go for a run, but then I got tired whilst I was getting dressed and decided honeycomb ice cream would taste nice and that I should probably get some exercise but obviously running would be too strenuous, so I thought I'd walk to the newsagents where the Chinese man with the sapphire eyes works because they remind me of that ring and well, just you I guess. Then I got here and I bought the ice cream, but then I remembered you didn't like honeycomb because it reminds you of bees and you got stung that day we went to the zoo and had a reaction. So, what flavor do you want me to buy you?" he replied.

"Jesus Christ," Bucky said.

"You can't eat him, Stevie. We'll have the whole damn Christian population at our doorstep with pitchforks damning us both to hell and it'd be really fucking loud and our home really can't accommodate that many people. Although I suppose we'll be fucked anyway if you were able to eat Jesus because the return of Jesus is supposed to be the apocalypse and I'm not sure even we could survive that one," he said.

"What the fuck are you talking about, Bucky? I swear I have no idea what you say sometimes. Buy your honeycomb ice cream and come back to bed. I just want coffee and you." 

"I'll buy you coffee flavored," he told Steve after a moment's pause and then hung up.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

"We're going on a picnic!" Steve's mother exclaimed as she burst through the front door he had only just opened.

Bucky quickly threw his cigarette out the window and bit his lip. He frowned at Steve's mother and flicked his eyes over to Steve with what seemed like accusation. Steve looked between the two of them and shrugged. His mother watched as he pulled on a pair of ripped, black jean shorts and one of Bucky's tatty grey jumpers and he knew she wasn't impressed but he also knew she wouldn't say anything because he had a tendency to get angry and that wasn't much fun for anybody. He stared at Bucky the entire time they were in the car whilst he looked out the window. His skin had begun to tan because it was getting warmer and he still looked pretty unhealthy but Steve had thought he looked good. He was wearing an old black sweater that drooped on one side at the neckline and Steve could see the jut of his collarbone. His hair looked particularly messy but he didn't seem to mind much and neither did Steve.

"Buck?" he asked softly.

He turned to look at Steve with a slight sparkle in his blue-grey eyes and Steve's heart leapt into his throat.

"Yes?" he replied.

"Nothing."

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

One day Steve got back from the bookstore and Bucky was sitting on the bathroom floor watching as ruby rivers flowed from his wrists. There was a masochistic smile on his face as he stared at his handiwork and Steve struggled for a moment to step forward, frightened to break the intense calm Bucky seemed to be wrapped in. Steve fell to my knees in front of him and put his hands over the cuts.

"Bucky? Don't do that again, okay?" Steve whispered.

Bucky chuckled softly for a moment before his head lifted and then the smile fell from his face and he let out a heart-breaking whimper.

"I'm sorry. I needed to get it out," he murmured shakily.

"Get what out?"

"The hate. I don't like hate. There was so much of it. I swear I was starting to go insane," he replied.

"Well, next time, we'll get it out another way. Okay? We'll figure out a way to get it out."

Bucky nodded and let out what sounded like a huff of relief. "Like when the world is spinning too fast and I have to bite you?" he asked.

"Yeah, just like that." 

"Can you make coffee?" he asked.

"Lets have a shower first and clean you up. I'll make coffee straight after I promise." 

"Can we bring Franz in the shower? .

"Cats don't like water, Buck."

"I forgot. That's a shame." 

 

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

"Christ, look at you! Steve, what have I said about feeding him? His heart will give up on him soon if he's not careful!" Steve's mother exclaimed one Sunday morning.

Bucky was leaning against the fridge holding a mug of hot frothy coffee. He was happy and so was Steve.

"Mom, Bucky is fine. I'm fine. We're both just fine," Steve told her.

"You look as white as a sheet. You've got bags under your eyes like you've been punched or mugged or Lord knows what else. How is that fine?" she asked.

Steve was thankful that she hadn't mentioned anything about the new bruises on Bucky's torso and he's sure this is something that Steve knew.

"Steve's insomnia is back but we're working on it. He'll be fine in a week," Bucky murmured against the edge of the mug.

Steve looked over at him in surprise. Even though Bucky was more than capable of acting alive and enthusiastic in public, he very rarely put the effort in around Steve's mother and mostly left Steve to do all the talking. Bucky smiled at him shyly for a moment before going back to tending his coffee.

"Oh, well, if you're sure," Steve's mother said.

Steve thinks she was pleased with him too. They were both pleased. It was a good day.

"Mom, we're still seeing Doctor Thomas. Everything is under control. She'd help if anything ever got really bad," Steve assured her.

"I know, I know. I just worry about you, that's all. You really do need to start eating more though, Bucky, dear. A man like you shouldn't be wasting away like that," she said.

"Mom, Bucky is just Bucky." 

Steve's mom frowned at him and scratched her head. He watched as her knitting needle moved with the action.

"I don't understand you two sometimes. I swear you live in your own little world. Then again, this whole generation of yours is a little bit wacky and messed up isn't it? I find you all very difficult to understand," she replied.

Steve scoffed and shook my head. "Mom, we're fine. Bucky is fine. I am fine. Can you please stop talking to us like we're broken pieces of china for you to glue back together. We're not projects you know."

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

"Do you think Steinbeck preferred George or Lennie?" Bucky asked Steve.

They were laid out on the balcony in their underwear reading their books and the world felt strangely still and breakable with a sky made of glass and humans roaming the ground like knives.

"Lennie," Steve told him.

"How come?" 

"Don't pretend you don't already know exactly what I'm going to say," Steve said.

"I like hearing you talk. It makes everything else go quiet."

Steve wasn't sure what he meant when he said this, but Steve turned down the page in his book and looked over at him anyway.

"They both struggled in their own ways, like all humans do I suppose and I don't doubt that everything would end up getting a lot harder and a lot worse as time passed for them. When Steinbeck killed Lennie he set him free. He set him free from himself, from George, from Curly, from society, from the Depression, from everything. I'm sure Steinbeck had more respect for George, but ultimately I think he preferred Lennie. Lennie was innocent and he was flawed and he was good. He's the kind of character that everyone loves more than anyone else. If you think about it though, George represents the everyday man. George is the man that has to suffer and give up his hopes and dreams because life's not really like that and he's in pain most of the time but he carries on anyway because there's no alternative. But no one loves the everyday man. Not really. We respect him and understand him, but he represents all of us and secretly we all resent that because we don't want to be him but we are," Steve explained.

"I love you," Bucky whispered.

Steve didn't understand Bucky then and he found it frustrating, but he knew that no one would ever really understand Bucky and that at least he was here and he was Steve's, even though he was everything and Steve was little more than a tuft floating in the wind.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

Steve remembers waking up one morning to the smell of coffee and a cold, empty bed. He lifted his head but then almost immediately put it back down again.

"You can't move," Bucky told him.

"Are you painting?" 

"Yes." 

"I'm not wearing anything," Steve replied.

"Exactly." 

Steve had felt uncomfortable and horribly vulnerable, but it was only Bucky and that was enough to settle his nerves a little.

"I need my meds, Buck," Steve said after a while.

"I hate the fucking things." 

"I know, but Jesus Christ you'd hate me more than you'd hate them if I go without." 

He didn't say anything after that but he did bring Steve his meds and it wasn't long before Steve fell back asleep.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

"So how are you feeling today, Steve?" Doctor Thomas asked once she'd gathered her pens and books and sheets and finally sat down opposite him.

Steve thinks it might have been a Thursday. Her voice was synthetically soothing and calm and Steve knew it was something she'd been trained to do to stop some of the more severe cases from jumping out the nearest window within the first thirty seconds.

"I'm fine," Steve's sure he must have replied.

He hated looking her in the eyes so he focused on his bitten nails instead. He didn't like the pity people like her always expressed. He never understood it. The room was quiet and still and the tick, tick, ticking of the clock always seemed too loud and reminded him just how heavy he was in the armchair and how gravity would always work against him. He wanted to take it down and smash it but he knew in therapy that was considered counterproductive. Therapy was bullshit, but it kept his mother happy and Steve figured that was worth it.

"Okay, and if you were to rate yourself from one to ten, ten being very good and one being very bad, where would you put yourself?" she had asked in the same tone.

"Four or five maybe, I don't know. You'll have to ask me later," Steve replied.

"You've said that for the past six weeks, Steve."

"Have I?"

"Yes. Why is that do you think?" 

"I don't know." 

He liked to play with the fraying material of his ripped jeans and he thinks this irritated her just like it did his mother.

"Okay, and did you manage to complete your goals this week? Did you go for a walk every day? Did you meet your friends for coffee? Did you go to all your classes?" Doctor Thomas asked.

"I've been going out at about three in the morning and walking by the river. I like it out there. The breeze is cold and makes my face sting and I like looking at the lights on the other side," he answered.

It had started raining outside and it made Steve feel calm and sleepy.

"Why at three in the morning? Are you having trouble sleeping again?" she asked.

"I've been sleeping somewhere between two and five hours a night. It's bad, I know. Bucky is worried. My mother is worried. But I'm fine once I actually get to sleep. The problem is my head; my mind won't shut up long enough to let me get to sleep. It's too busy at the moment. Its like Times Square in rush hour sometimes." Steve wasn't making much sense, but he supposed that there was a reason he was sat rambling to a therapist and it was probably something to do with the fact that he was filled with so much shit.

"And does walking help with that?" she asked.

"Yeah, I guess. The cold air helps and sometimes if I go to Times Square and scream really loudly then all the traffic leaves my head and goes back into the real world. Bucky gets it." 

"Is he sleeping?" Doctor Thomas asked.

"This isn't his session. But yes, he sleeps on and off all the damn time. I'm glad though; he smiles in his sleep," Steve replied.

"Does he not smile when he's awake?" she asked with a frown.

"Of course he does. The thing about Bucky though, Doctor Thomas, is that he notices far too much and he can smile all day long but its not until he falls asleep and turns stupid that he can smile without it feeling like his lips are stretching into an upturned representation of a lie. He's sad, but he doesn't know it. He knows everything else, but Jesus Christ he doesn't know how sad he is."

"Do you want me to ask him about that?" she questioned.

"Of course not. It would be catastrophic. I would have thought you'd understand that now. Bucky is everything and if he starts to notice himself as much as he does everything else then the whole world is going to simultaneously implode and explode. Don't ask me to elaborate. I don't have the time to explain Bucky to someone that sits behind a clipboard and hands over my pills." 

The session ended relatively promptly after that.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

"If I got fat would you leave me?" Steve asked Bucky as he licked the sugar from his fingertips.

It was a warm day and they were eating donuts in the park. Bucky was scared of the birds though so they had to sit further away from the river than most people.

"Is that what you think of me?" he had replied.

Steve turned to look at him and his eyes seemed darker than normal and Steve couldn't work out what could have caused that.

"It happened to Kayla," Steve told him. "They were on holiday in the Dominican Republic I think and he met this girl at the pool bar and she was really skinny and tanned and blonde and he told Kayla that he only had one life and this woman was too good of an opportunity to pass up, so either they could take a break for the day or break up. She phoned me straight after and I told her that her phone bill was going to be goddamn awful and that she should charge him for her emotional distress, but then she just started crying harder and it was pretty awful. They're married now with two kids, of course, but at the time it was an ugly mess. She's been a vegan ever since," Steve explained.

"If they weren't both so messed up I'd probably feel sorry for them. I'm going to watch Jason next time we go around for a drink. I bet his hair is starting to fall out," Bucky replied.

"What has his hair got to do with anything?" 

"Jason doesn't deserve hair." 

"So does Kayla deserve to be with a man that has no hair then? What did she do?" Steve questioned.

"She married him and forced his DNA on two innocent children. How silly can you get?"

"She loved him." 

"No. Kayla and Jason love themselves. They love what the other gives to them in terms of emotional stimulation. You love me but you're a raging storm and burning fire all by yourself and you don't need me to make the Earth spin. You're you and I am me and we're two completely separate elements that shouldn't work but do and we love each other but we don't finish each other. You're the open end of a sentence and you should always be left that way because otherwise someone would stamp out your metaphors and similes and you'd be nothing but a string of empty words and then what is the point of anything?" he said.

"How's your writing going?" Steve replied.

"I haven't written a word," he answered.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

"Did you know that cat was stuck in the hallway?" Steve's mother asked as she came through the front door with Franz by her side.

"I suppose he grew tired of us," Steve replied.

"It's a cat, I'm not sure they grow tired of anything. They don't even think."

"Franz thinks," Bucky informed her.

Steve smiled widely at him and then at his mother and for a short moment she looked almost frightened.

"You look happy," she said to Steve.

"Of course I do. Didn't you know it was a Wednesday?" he asked her.

"You hate Wednesdays," his mother replied.

Steve looked over at Bucky and he was chewing on his lip and suddenly Steve's lungs were filling with saltwater again and there was too much acid in his veins.

"You're right. I do hate Wednesdays. Wednesdays are fucking awful days aren't they? Jesus Christ. I don't understand why they exist. Mom, can you go? I want to sleep," Steve said in a tired voice.

His mother rolled her eyes and left again.

"Are you okay?" Bucky asked him as he picked him up and carried him into the bathroom.

"I need to burn. I need to stand in a very hot shower and I need you to kiss me and touch me until there is nothing but fire in my bones and metal on my tongue and the universes start exploding behind my eyes," Steve told him.

"Okay," he replied.

Bucky knew. If there was one thing Steve could count on it was that Bucky knew. He was so much more than anyone and anything else and Steve sometimes wondered what would be left if Bucky were to no longer exist and then Steve's world would become so utterly terrifying and dark that he had to run from the thought until he found myself back in Bucky's arms and Steve's callused fingers could bury themselves in his hair and Steve knew that the stitches holding him together were strong enough to make it through at least one more day.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

There always seemed to be the occasional random day in their lives where they didn't see each other at all. Steve never understood how it happened, but they arrived sporadically throughout the year as if they'd been planned by some omnipotent being. Strangely, he didn't dislike them. He didn't like them either of course but he didn't find them anymore challenging than any other day and he supposed that's what Bucky had meant when he said they were not a compounded unit. One evening in late August Steve was sat at a little table outside a café with a cigarette he'd stolen from Bucky's jacket earlier in the day, a large mug of caramel coffee and a book. He was writing notes in the book because it seemed like one of those novels that couldn't simply be read and not pulled to pieces. Bucky had taught him a long time ago that to read a book and not analyse it is to not really read it at all. Steve still wasn't completely convinced by this philosophy of Bucky's but on days with the consonant 's' in it somewhere, Steve made sure to accept it.

"Hi, Steve!" a bubbly voice exclaimed as a sweet-faced girl from his English lit class sat opposite him.

"Hi, Ruby," he replied softly.

"Your poem today was lovely."

"Thank you. It took me a long time to write."

"Well, it was worth it. I wish mine had turned out like that. Then again, I suppose writing about my pet turtle never was going to churn up much in terms of poetic genius was it?" she asked with a laugh.

Steve laughed a little too and took a sip of his coffee.

"I didn't realise you read Bukowski!" she exclaimed once she took her sunglasses off and settled them on the table.

"I found it on a park bench. It was starting to rain and I couldn't stand the thought of leaving it to its soggy demise," he told her.

"How do things like that happen to you?" she asked.

"Things like that happen all the time, Ruby."

"Then how do you manage to make it all sound so damn romantic?" she replied.

Steve didn't think it sounded romantic at all.

"That's what happens when you live with Bucky," he said.

"Your boyfriend?"

"I'll bring him to the party on Friday. You can meet him then. He'll help you with your poetry I promise."

"Is he good at writing too?" she questioned.

"He doesn't write. Words fail him for some reason. He is a writer though. He feels too damn much and sees everything all at once and I don't think even Hemingway could have managed to write the world as it appears to him," he said.

"He sounds interesting," Ruby said.

"He is."

It grew silent then and Steve doesn't know how she felt about the quiet but he was thankful for it and he felt strangely calm. There was an uncomfortable churning in his gut as his mind drifted over to where Bucky might be in the world and he supposed he was probably out on some adventure that he'd spend hours recounting to Steve later. It wouldn't matter what he'd done or how simple a thing it was, but to Bucky it would have been something so earth shattering that he wouldn't be able to sleep properly for a week and he'd be smoking hash on the balcony like an addict until Steve's mother turned up again and he had to pretend that he'd just been enjoying the fresh air. His mother wasn't stupid though. At this point she'd learnt to correspond the thinness of Bucky's body and the number of bruises decorating his skin with the quantity of nicotine and illegal substances that was flowing through him. Steve never spoke to him about it and Bucky never spoke to Steve about it but they both knew it was a problem and they both knew it would never get any better. Steve had decided a long time ago that if he couldn't save him then he might just as well fall with him and so, more often than not, his mother would arrive to find them both blue and glassy eyed and then she'd leave for a couple of days and when she returned all would be back the way it was before. Steve doesn't understand how any of these things became things, but at some point they did and now he misses them.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

"Stevie, you're home!" Bucky exclaimed with a wide smile on his face when Steve tripped through the front door one Friday afternoon.

A drop of blood fell from his cracked lips and Steve laughed softly as he carelessly wiped at it with the back of his hand.

"Had a good day, Buck?" 

Steve couldn't help but sigh when Bucky wrapped his arms around him like a warm cocoon and he marvelled at the fact that Bucky's fingertips didn't feel like ice.

"I had lunch with an old couple. I want us to be an old couple, Stevie. You should have seen them. They were all made up of warm doughy softness and toffee sweetness and I wished you could have seen them with me," he said.

"What did they smell like?"

"Apples," he replied and squeezed him tighter.

"Apples do smell wonderful don't they?" 

"You smell like apples sometimes. But then other times you smell like caramel and cigarettes and grass and this other smell that I can only ever find on you." 

"That's nice," Steve replied.

"I never want to let go of you. Do you think that's possible? Do you think I could just hold you forever and ever until we melted into one person so that no one could ever pull us apart? I want that. If I have to die and never hear or see or speak again then I want to still be able to feel you. I don't want to be without you ever. You do know that, don't you?" he asked him.

"Of course I know that, Bucky. You know I'll never leave you," Steve assured him.

Steve bit deeply into his shoulder until he was sure he'd left a bruise and then pulled back to stare into his blue-grey eyes.

"I think one day I'll be made to leave you though. I think you'll live forever but they'll make me leave you," Bucky whispered with frightened eyes.

"I won't let them take you, I promise," Steve murmured.

Bucky sighed deeply and brushed his nose softly against Steve's.

"Your nose is cold," he said.

"It's okay," Steve replied.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

"Let's chase the sun," Bucky said as he put his dirty mug in the sink.

"Excuse me?" Steve replied in confusion.

"I think we should get in the car and follow the sun as it goes down. I don't care where we end up but it's going to be the closest thing we'll ever feel to the edge of the world," he continued as he pulled on his jacket and grabbed the car keys from his book pile.

Steve didn't say anything as he slid my feet into his Vans and picked up both his journal and Bucky's camera. Steve had learnt over time to never question anything impulsive that Bucky wanted to do. He knew he'd go insane with the idea if he didn't act on it. Steve didn't care if they had to do something so stupid that he had to phone his mom to pick them up from the police station. He can't even remember what illegal thing they'd done that one time but it hadn't been bad enough to walk away with anything more than a warning. Bucky had apologised to Steve's mother and she had huffed out a sigh and then they'd all eaten waffles in a little diner and spoken about Steve's birthday. Chasing the sun seemed a relatively sane request considering past adventures and even though Steve knew they'd never actually be able to do it the way he was probably imagining, it would still make him happy. Steve liked it when Bucky was happy. He wanted him to always be happy. They got in the car and Bucky started to drive and then they chased the sun.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

It was raining and Steve found him in the park and Steve swears nobody had felt as bad on a Friday as he did then.

"Bucky?" Steve had approached softly.

"I don't understand, Stevie. Everything is entirely too much and never enough all at the same time and I don't understand how that can be?" he whispered shakily.

Steve sat beside him in the wet grass with his knees to his chest and started pulling at the green blades until his skin split open under the pressure. He was so breakable. They both were.

"I don't know what to say," Steve admitted.

"You feel like this a lot," he stated. "You do, don't you? Don't lie to me. I can tell," he murmured.

"Yes," I agreed hollowly.

"What do you think happened to us? I feel like we're both going crazy. Are we? I'm not even sure if I can tell anymore," he said.

"I think we should call Doctor Thomas. Things are bad now I think."

"I think they are too."

* * *

Steve was worried when he got home to find Bucky and what appeared to be Monty out on the balcony. Bucky was hunched over with his arms folded on the railings and Monty had a comforting hand on his back. Steve dropped his bag to the floor but didn't move. Monty turned his head around and frowned for a moment before a small smile breached his tanned face. Steve had felt like his heart had fallen into his stomach. Bucky was sad. Bucky was very sad. Steve didn't need to look into his eyes to know. He could see it in the tired curve of his spine.

"Buck?" Steve whispered.

Monty shook his head.

"Bucky?"

"I'm okay," he replied in a broken voice.

It frightened Steve that he sounded so far away. It was something he understood, but Bucky was usually the one anchored to the ground and Steve didn't know whether he was strong enough to keep them both rooted.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

The first time Bucky and Steve met had been strange and cliché. It was a Wednesday and Steve was crawling through life on two hours of restless sleep. He didn't look great. He was walking towards the campus to attend a class and even though he'd already missed every class that week, he still found himself suddenly walking in the opposite direction and entering the first coffee shop he came to. It was small and quaint with exposed brick walls and hanging fairy lights. He ordered a caramel latte from a tired looking woman in her thirties that may or may not have been called Jane, and then he sat down at the counter and turned to stare out the window. The world had seemed frightening to him that day and the numbing effects of his medication were only barely keeping his anxiety at bay. Terror had been lashing down his throat and into his veins and he was practically choking on saltwater as he raised his mug of coffee to his lips to chase it all away. He was so cold, yet his eyes burnt with the memory of acidic tears and he hated how weak he was. His innate urge to run and hide had seemed overpowering and he felt completely helpless as he watched the people out the window rushing to work or school or some other important appointment that would actually help them get somewhere in life. Steve, on the other hand, had been going absolutely nowhere. Whilst most of his friends were studying, attending classes, drinking, partying, practicing promiscuity and just generally enjoying what would likely be the best years of their lives, Steve was living with his mother, missing doctor appointments and trying to get from one day to the next without throwing himself into the Hudson. Things had been pretty bad and being sat like a coward in the safety of a little coffee shop only reassured him of what a waste of space he was.

"What do you think about the GM crop bullshit then?" a deep voice from close by had broken through his internal monologue.

Steve turned my head to face blue-grey eyes and a mop of brown hair that had been pushed and tied back by a tatty piece of white cloth. He was beautiful and soft and unbearably heartbreaking.

"Excuse me?" Steve replied when Bucky raised an eyebrow to prove that, yes, he was talking to him.

Steve flushed red in embarrassment when he looked around the small space and noticed that they were the only two people there; it had obviously been quite a long time since he'd arrived and time had been passing him by unnoticed.

"GM crops. What do you think?" he asked in what seemed like genuine interest.

Steve's gaze dropped down to the counter and he caught a glimpse of a folded newspaper with the headline of 'GM Crops in U.S'. At least he knew he wasn't an insane green thumb, is what Steve seems to remember thinking.

"As long as children don't start being born with three heads I don't really see the problem," Steve replied in a relatively flat tone.

He wasn't good at talking to strangers.

Bucky let out a quiet hum and pursed his lips. "I agree." 

Steve didn't know what to say then, but he squirmed uncomfortably in his seat under the heat of his stare that Steve could feel along the side of his face. Strangely enough, the silence itself wasn't awkward. It had almost been nice.

"I don't like Wednesdays," Steve had whispered after a few minutes.

"I don't like them much either," Bucky had replied.

Steve looked up at him then and Bucky had smiled at him sadly as if he knew how fast the Earth was spinning and how the air was so delicate and breakable and always too thin and how all the darkness was pulling Steve down, down, down.

"Do you want another coffee?" he asked just in time to stop the waves from crashing over him.

"Please," Steve had replied.

Steve had been asking for so much more than that and they had both known it, but they didn't talk about it and Bucky didn't flinch. Steve visited the coffee shop everyday after that for his caramel latte and sparkly-eyed dosage of oxygen. His education was going down the drain but he was just thankful that getting up in the morning was that bit easier now that he had something to look forward to. Steve's mother visited them there some days and when he told her he was moving out to live with Bucky she didn't question it because at least he'd start making it to his classes instead of reading Keats and Fitzgerald in the coffee shop all day every day. That is the promise that Steve had made her now that he was going to be falling asleep and waking up beside Bucky. Steve had gotten a little better and he watched as Bucky was tossed through a pattern of better and worse in a state of oblivion, but they were okay and life was that little bit more bearable now that they had each other to cling to. Sometimes Steve wonders whether them meeting had been the best thing to happen to them both, or their personal damnation, but once it'd happened it was too late then anyway.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

"I'm so cold, Buck. I'm so, so cold. It feels like I've got ice sliding through my veins and down my spine and there's got to be icicles hanging from my bones because I swear I'm frozen, Bucky, and I can't stop shaking and there's goose bumps all over. How do you stand it? I'm so cold, Bucky," Steve whispered down the phone with trembling hands.

"Where are you?" Bucky asked worriedly. "Stevie, I need you to tell me where you are."

"I'm in an alley, somewhere near Ruby's I think. I'm not sure. I can't remember properly. I took some pills, Buck. I was so stupid. I don't even know what they were. They were uppers though. I know that. God, there's all this colour just swirling around me and I can't get up from the ground because my head is too heavy, but the concrete is cold and it's hard and I don't like it. I think my nose might be bleeding," Steve told him in a shaky rush.

"Stevie, I need you to stay awake, okay? I want you to keep talking to me. Don't stop. Don't close your eyes, not even for a second. Do you hear me, Steve? Keep talking. Don't let me down, all right?" he said.

"Okay, Buck. I'll keep talking."

"Good. Good boy."

"What were you doing? I'm sorry I got mad at you. You didn't need to come to the party. I knew you didn't want to and I shouldn't have tried to force you. It's probably best you didn't actually otherwise we might both be laying on the ground stuck," Steve said with a laugh, despite the fact that this really wasn't very funny at all.

"I was just reading. I should have come. I wouldn't have let you take the pills. Who gave them to you anyway?" he asked.

"I don't know what his name was. I've never seen him before."

"It was a guy?" he asked.

"Yeah. He was ugly though. His eyes weren't pretty like yours."

"Keep your eyes open, Stevie," he demanded when it went silent for a moment.

"I'm trying," Steve groaned. "My head hurts."

"It's okay. I'll be there soon and we'll take you to the hospital. They'll make it all better," he replied.

"Mom is going to kill me, I swear. She's going to be so mad."

"I know. It'll be okay though." 

"Are you mad?" Steve whispered.

"Yes," he replied tightly.

"I'm sorry," Steve told him in a small voice.

"Not at you, Stevie. I'm mad at me, and at that guy, and at Ruby, and at everyone and everything." 

"That's a whole lot of mad, Buck. Careful, you might explode." 

"Yeah, well, you're laying on the ground in an alleyway somewhere," he answered.

"It's not very nice. It smells funny. Would it be bad if I smoked some weed right now? I think I can get my hand in my pocket… it might calm me down?" Steve said.

"No! No don't smoke anything!"

Steve huffed out in annoyance. "But everything is so fucking crazy in my head I just want to relax for a minute or go to sleep or do something other than just fucking lie here!" Steve complained.

"Steve, just breathe okay? I'll be there as soon as I can." 

It wasn't much longer before Bucky found him and Steve had managed to hang on up until the point where he got him in the car. He woke up the next day in the hospital to him and his mother sat on either side of him. He'd been signed up to an extra session of therapy every week.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

"What's he doing?" Steve's mother asked as Bucky shut the front door behind her.

"He's dancing to Grouplove," he had replied with a smile wide enough that Steve could see his straight white teeth.

"Why? What's going on?" she asked in confusion.

It had been comical how wide her eyes had been and how completely out of place she'd looked as she watched Steve dancing around and laughing.

"He's happy," Bucky replied.

"But he's not even dressed. Did he not go to his classes?" she said.

"No. He didn't feel great this morning. He said looking after his mental health was more important than conforming to the social belief that we all need a degree to get anywhere in life. He's been feeling pretty liberal today. He was ranting to me all morning about how people think if you don't go to university you just drop off the face of the earth and starve to death. Then he started talking about how half the women in the world are starving to death and the other half are dieting and how messed up that is and then yeah, dancing I guess. It's a good day though. I like him like this. He's very clever you know. I love him more today than any other day I think," he had explained.

"You two are insane. I don't understand. I don't understand at all," she had replied with a laugh before nodding her head along to the music and turning on the kettle.

ﾟ*･✧°･ﾟ*･

Some days they were granted with a reprieve from their messed up mentalities and they were both so excited when they looked over at each other and realised that they really were okay at that particular moment that they turned into five year olds again. It was on one of these days in mid-May when they somehow found themselves having handstand competitions on the beach at Coney Island. They'd sung loudly during the entire car ride and their throats were sore by the time they arrived. It was okay though because they felt light and sugary and delicious and they bought an ice cream dipped in chocolate each as they walked along the sea front and everything just felt so damn good. The air was sweet and crisp and their heads were filled with the sounds of children laughing and there was so much to see and feel now that they weren't being blinded by the realities of their sadness and Steve swears if he could have died in that very moment he would have been happy. They could have died blissfully together in the sand with the sun on their faces and the sea breeze in their hair and Steve really believes they would have been content. But as they drove home and the darkness crept into the sky, the darkness crept back into their bones and so they crawled into bed with tears staining their cheeks and a crushing weight settling over their chests. Those days were heaven, but those nights were hell.

**Author's Note:**

> I know that the story feels unfinished and I'm considering writing a second chapter (or more) to wrap things up, so let me know if you'd like more.
> 
> If you are going to comment please be gentle with me because this is my version of stripping myself bare.


End file.
